Kamoro culture back from brink of extinction

By Gus Kairupan

TIMIKA, Irian Jaya (JP): Possibly, probably, maybe, perhaps and more such words and sentences that indicate anything but solid certainty. If you were to read an account on Irian Jaya's background, say, as a foreword to a more detailed essay on that part of the island of New Guinea, you would notice that it rather teems with such words: probably 200 languages; some 1,800 species of insects; perhaps most are barely unknown; maybe this, possibly that.

Will Irian Jaya ever be fully revealed? Of course, but your guess is just as good as anyone else's as to when this will occur.

A lot is already known about Indonesia's easternmost province, but there is vastly more that is not, and it covers practically every aspect of the place: flora, fauna, customs, people, their languages. Did you know that as recently as 1987 two never-before-known groups of people emerged out of isolation? Who is to say that these are the last ethnic groups in Irian Jaya to step out of the jungle?

Yet New Guinea has not escaped the notice of the world outside. There exist accounts from the distant past of some of the products of the island such as seafood, medicinal bark, plumes of the birds of paradise and other things, which made their way to other parts of Indonesia as well as China and even France.

But apart from a vague "from the far east", those on the receiving end could not be expected to have a clear picture of products' place of origin. Trade has been going on for quite a long time, as did some mixing between native Irianese and ethnic groups from other parts of Indonesia. But, by and large, the island remained an enigma for quite a long time.

Gradually, however, the shrouds of mystery began to lift, not least because of the voyages from Western countries -- Portugal in particular -- that started about halfway through the second millennium. The purpose of these voyages in Indonesia is well known: the Spice Islands. New Guinea then became a more concrete entity to these seafarers from Portugal (and later, the English, Spanish and Dutch), but though it loomed large in the region, attention was focused on a handful of minuscule spice producing islands, among others Ambon and Banda, located a stone's throw west of Irian.

Sightings and landings were made by Portuguese and Spanish seafarers during the third decade of the 16th century, Dutchman Jan Carstensz sighted the snow-covered mountain range that runs through central Irian in 1632, and in 1770 Captain Cook's landing party at the Asmat territory "was sent packing with volleys of arrows".

There was contact, but apart from the mingling in coastal areas with peoples from other islands, there seemed not to have been any deliberate move to occupy New Guinea. Attempts by the British and Dutch during the late 18th and early 19th century to establish a more permanent presence met with failure, but the turn of the century saw the beginning of just such a presence taking shape in the area.

At that time there were three Western powers sharing the island, the Netherlands, Britain and Germany, so colonial politicking would certainly be a major consideration, more than whatever the island could offer for international markets.

Kamoro

Today numbering about 16,000, the Kamoro tribe occupies a portion of an area located more or less in the middle of Irian Jaya's southern coastal area, stretching about 300 km from Etna Bay eastwards to the Otokwa river. The river runs some 40 km east of the port of Amamapare, the exit point of copper, gold and silver concentrate mined by PT Freeport Indonesia Company. The area occupied by the Kamoro belongs to a larger group known as the Mimika.

The tribe has had contacts with the outside world as far back as the 17th century but until missionaries arrived in the 19th century, these were far and few between. The missions were, at least during that era, the only established presence in New Guinea. Administrative order (i.e. the tools of Dutch, British and German colonial rule) came about during the first years of the 20th century, and helped intensify proselytizing activities.

Some benefits may have resulted from time these activities, but they also brought about a far more serious consequence: the loss of many features of Kamoro culture and traditions, among others those connected with rites of passage.

Longhouses, the traditional living quarters of the Kamoro, were destroyed and they were made to live in houses for individual families.

Another highly developed talent of the Kamoro is wood carving, but this art, too, began to languish because of the bans imposed by missionaries, and later by government regulations after Irian Jaya became part of Indonesia.

For much more than half a century, Kamoro art, culture and traditions teetered on the brink of extinction. But times change, and so did attitudes on the part of the missionaries and authorities.

PT Freeport Indonesia, which operates in the area which includes the traditional area of the Kamoro, claims that reviving the culture of the native tribes in the contract of work area is part of the company's social development program.

The company, a target of much criticism regarding its environment practices and relations with local communities, also claims it has to rely for its workforce on the tribes whose homeland lies in the company's area of operations.

In fact, the company has reaped benefits from the knowledge of the Kamoro. When the environmental department was at a loss about how to stem subsiding of dikes and berms in the experimental ponds, it was the Kamoro who came up with the idea of using sago tree trunks instead.

But more than any other activity, it is artistic expression that helps restore or rediscover one's cultural identity. Lately, there has been a wave of efforts to revive many aspects of native Indonesian artistic expressions, most prominent of which would be the series of recordings produced by the Masyarakat Seni Pertunjukan Indonesia (Indonesian Society for the Performing Arts) of the myriad variety of musical styles in this country. Assistance for this project came from the Smithsonian Institution and the Ford Foundation, whilst for the revival of Kamoro arts.

PT Freeport Indonesia showed their interest in the project by organizing the first Kamoro Arts & Culture Festival, that ran recently at the village of Hitipau, some 30 kilometers southwest of the town of Timika. Participants came from all 42 Kamoro villages in the area. A dance festival, canoe races and an art auction were the major programs of the festival.

Canoes play an important part in the lives of the Kamoro whose villages are near either a river or the sea. The canoe has been and probably still is the most important mode of transport for them.

Like the Asmat tribe, the Kamoro certainly do not suffer from a lack of creativity and imagination. At this stage the Asmat and Kamoro appear to be the only tribes that stand out as carvers, with the former enjoying wider appreciation around the globe since more than thirty years. But after this first Festival it will be only a matter of time for the art of the Kamoro to achieve equal prominence in as well as outside Indonesia.